Situated on a
lovely country lane in the hamlet of Kortijnen, near Retie (Belgium), stands
a war memorial dedicated to the crew and passengers of C47, or Dakota, 42-100981.
The location of the monument is near the crash site of the airplane, an event
that occurred on 17 September 1944 during World War Two at the beginning of
Operation Market Garden.

OPERATION
MARKET GARDEN - short summary

The unexpected success
of Operation Overlord in Normandy (France), led to the general belief
that it was feasible to end the war before Christmas 1944.

British Field Marshall
Bernard Montgomery and American General Omar Bradley each had their own
plan to issue one final blow to the German armed forces.

The American commander
in chief, General Dwight Eisenhower was impressed by the daring but carefully
detailed Montgomery plan and issued the order to execute this offensive
as quickly as possible.

The plan was codenamed
Operation Market Garden and consisted of two main parts: an aerial offensive
(Market) combined with a ground offensive (Garden).

The
main plan for Operation Market Garden (photo copied from Wikipedia)

The airborne operations
of Market consisted of three airborne divisions (US 101st en 82nd
Airborne Divisions and the British 1st Airborne Division) to be dropped
far behind the front line into enemy territory. All bridges from Neerpelt
(Belgium) up to and including those in Arnhem (The Netherlands) were to
be captured, thus creating a 'corridor' for British XXX Corps (the ground
troops in Garden) to move in quickly.

Operation Garden
was to ensure British XXX Corps to advance in three days from the Belgium
border to Arnhem through the area taken by the allied airborne divisions.
This would close off the German troops in the western part of The Netherlands
and enable the allies to advance to the heart of the industrial German
war machine, the Ruhr area.

Pathfinders
- US
101 Airborne Division

Pathfinders were used
to mark drop and landingzones for the main invasion force.

The specially trained
pathfinders were tasked with the quick installation of a radio beacon
(the Eureka system) and signal panelling on the drop and landingzones
in order to guide the airplanes of the main invastion force.

After visual contact
with the formations of the main invasion force, the pathfinders would
light smoke grenades for visual location purposes.

The four pathfinder
teams for the US 101 Airborne Division were to indicate and safeguard
the drop and landingzones near Veghel, Sint-Oedenrode and Son in The Netherlands.

It had taken off from
air base Chalgrove in England in the early afternoon of 17 September 1944
together with three other Dakotas carrying pathfinder crews of the US
101st Airborne Division. The pathfinders in plane 42-100981 were under
the command of 1Lt Charles M. FAITH. Their task was to mark and guard
landing zone A1 west of Veghel between the river Aa and the Zuid-Willemsvaart
canal.

The four pathfinder planes
followed the southern route across The Channel, over Knokke (Belgium)
with a turning point at Geel (Belgium) where the front line was marked
with orange smoke ('initial point').

The route then turned
north to prepare for the final run over enemy territory in the direction
of Retie (Belgium) and finally The Netherlands.

Flak units north of
the Kempisch canal immediately engaged the low flying airplanes. The left
engine of plane 42-100981 was hit and then the fuel tank in the left wing
caught fire. The airplane crashed in a ball of fire in Kortijnen near
Retie (Belgium) in which the farm owned by Jan Adriaensen and Peer Franken's
barn burnt to the ground.

The five man crew and
four of the ten pathfinders aboard did not survive the crash. Six pathfinders
were able to jump out of the burning plane. Five of them were taken prisoner
of war.

Lt FAITH was able to
escape through the fields and ended up with the Vos family who hid him
in the cellar until the liberation one week later.

Because of the crash,
first battalion of the 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment, assigned to
landing zone A1 were misdropped some 8 kms to the west over Heeswijk Dinther
in The Netherlands, suffering heavy losses. The Army Air Forces reported
the last known circumstances of plane 42-100981 and its crew in Missing
Air Crew Report 10716.

2001:
Kevin Deering, nephew of Pvt George L. Sarlas, in front of the memorial

Early 2000, Kevin Deering
was searching for information related to his uncle George L. Sarlas when
he met Petra Wenstedt-Pulles from Eindhoven, The Netherlands through an
internet forum. Petra was continuing her father's work, researching the
fate of members of the 101st Airborne Division in World War Two. Petra
succeeded in giving Kevin the information he needed in order to acknowledge
his uncle's war exploits.

Moreover, Petra discovered
that the crash site was not located in The Netherlands as the family had
come to believe, but in Kortijnen, a hamlet near Retie (Belgium).

In May 2000, Petra visited
the crash site. She took pictures, talked to eye witnesses and met with
Chris and Lydie Nuyts, great grandchildren of Jan Adriaensen, the farmer
whose property was devastated in the crash.

Through Petra's correspondence
Kevin and Chris also got in contact with each other.

In the meantime, Linda
Shauvin, pilot Eugene P. Shauvin's daughter, was on a quest for information
about her still missing father. Through another internet forum Linda got
in touch with Dave Berry, a history buff from Ohio (US). They discovered
that Kevin Deering was on the same quest so information was exchanged.
Back in Belgium, Lydie and Chris had started collecting information from
eye witnesses through the cooperation with another amateur historian Chris
Van Kerckhoven.

Chris and Lydie had informed
Retie council of the American interest in the event dating back to 17
September 1944 in Kortijnen.

The council, aware of
the emotional and historical value of both event and location decided
to erect a memorial near the crash site at the address Kortijnen 12.

Chris and her husband
Karel who inhabit the house which was built at the exact spot of the destroyed
farmhouse, kindly donated the land for the memorial. On completion of
the memorial, a large dedication ceremony was planned.

Among the attending
family members were Linda and Phyllis Shauvin (daughter and widow of pilot
Eugene P. Shauvin), and Jim Faith (son of Charles M. Faith).

In addition to Belgian
officals, the military attaché of the American embassy in Brussels was
present as well as an Honor Guard, a Royal British Legion delegation as
well as a delegation of Normandy Veterans.

After the folding of
the American flag by the Honor Guard, it was presented to the missing
pilot's widow.

Oxygen
tank recovered by Screaming Eagles of WWII Foundation. The tank had been
launched on impact.

Exhumation
effort

The remains of pilot
Eugene P. Shauvin's body were never found.

The combined research
of Dave Berry, and Chris and Lydie Nuyts led to the theory that the remains
were still inside the cockpit of the airplane.

The CILHI (Central Identification
Laboratory in Hawaï)* was convinced to start an exhumation effort in Kortijnen.
In August and September 2003 the CILHI team, consisting of eleven team
members, came to Kortijnen to research the crash site.

Unfortunately, the status
of Eugene P. Shauvin remains 'MIA/BNR' (missing in action / body not recovered),
even after this professional and complete research.